


Better a Witty Fool

by Astronomical_Aphrodite



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Arthur Morgan, Fluff and Angst, High Honor Arthur Morgan, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, Oblivious Arthur, Period-Typical Homophobia, Slow Burn, Torture, Trans Kieran Duffy, Transphobia, trans author
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:54:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22877392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astronomical_Aphrodite/pseuds/Astronomical_Aphrodite
Summary: Arthur knows that he better watch himself, because that O’Driscoll boy’s blue eyes are too soft for his own good, his pleas made in desperation, but nonetheless still genuine. It isn’t like he hasn’t been in love before, of course, but rather that it had never turned out well for him in the past.If he’s not careful, he could catch feelings, and that wasn’t even the worst thing that could happen.
Relationships: Abigail Roberts Marston/John Marston, Arthur Morgan & Dutch van der Linde, Hosea Matthews & Arthur Morgan, Hosea Matthews/Dutch van der Linde (implied), Kieran Duffy/Arthur Morgan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 103





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> All I know is that I’m sad, and I love my dead gay sons.

Crouched behind a fence in the snow, Arthur held his binoculars to his face, trying not to shiver from the chill that somehow penetrated his thick wool coat and seeped into his bones. The abandoned mining town that they were staking out, Ewing Basin, was filled with O’Driscoll boys, milling around with their heads kept low and arms wrapped around themselves in an attempt to keep the cold at bay, and Arthur almost felt sorry for the lot of them.

Through the binoculars, he could see a man in a long coat grooming a horse meticulously, running a brush over its coat and stroking its muscular neck while feeding it what must’ve been sugar cubes or peppermints. Turning his attention towards the rest of the camp, he watched as a man walked out of a barn, heading towards the one with the horse.

“There they are,” Dutch drawled bitterly, “that’s them.”

“Colm?” Arthur asked.

“I think...” Dutch said, and Arthur watched as the man grooming his horse startled, turning towards the man walking towards him like he’d said something or called his name. Intimidated, he cowered in on himself, walking forwards despite his obvious trepidation. “Yeah,” he concluded, “that’s him.”

Colm mounted his horse, and the man gestured out towards the snow before turning to point at the rickety building next to them. He couldn’t make out what they were talking about, but even with the distance between them he could still see the hint of a frown on Colm’s face. “Who’s he talking to?” Bill asked, and Dutch hummed. “He don’t seem too happy.”

Whatever the case, Colm picked the boy up by his collar, physically lifting him off the ground as he grabbed at Colm’s wrist. Slapping him across the face, he spat something at him before dropping him, the boy stumbling backwards away from him. “No,” Dutch agreed. Running towards his horse, he climbed onto the red roan horse’s back, immediately turning to ride away from the makeshift camp. “Are they leaving?”

“Seems to be,” Arthur confirmed. Watching Colm turn his horse towards where the boy was leaving, he adjusted his grip on the reigns, the mount beneath him kicking in the snow. “Should we go get ‘em?” He asked, itching to get out there and do something.

“No,” Dutch answered immediately, tone one of warning, “Colm can wait. Best to get some of ‘em outta’ there.” He paused, and the boy and his horse finally left the camp, riding out of Arthur’s field of vision. “And much less fun to rob him and his score if he never finds out about it.”

When they made it down into the abandoned town, the firefight that ensued was tough, and although they didn’t lose any men doing it, Colm had left by the time it was over, and dozens of men were left dead or dying on the ground. It was a massacre, and even Arthur had been nicked in the leg by a bullet that had come too close for comfort. He downed a bottle of whiskey to kill the pain, wrapping the injury with a strip of cloth to stop the bleeding, and started looting corpses for spare ammunition and valuables.

“Hurry up, Arthur,” Dutch said, and he grunted in acknowledgement, dropping the body back down onto the ground with a dull thump and pocketing several dollars in change. They needed all the funds they could get for when they made it to a town so that they could at least purchase the food and medicine they needed to survive. “Search that building over there,” he directed, pointing towards a two story structure with no doors.

“Will do,” Arthur said obligingly. It wasn’t his position to say he’d rather scavenge what he could from the corpses when nobody else was about to do the same.

Inside, he found several bottles of alcohol and some meager rations on shelves and tables, alongside some smaller valuables that he figured wouldn’t sell for much to any fences. Within the large crate tucked into a corner, he found something significantly more interesting — dynamite piled high in smaller crates, cushioned by straw. Bill agreed that it all seemed fine, and that the explosives were of a high quality.

“Did we get everything?” Dutch asked them when they walked back outside, and Micah handed him a large, rolled up sheet of paper. Spreading it, he looked over the writing, squinting down at it.

“Think so, boss,” Micah said, always a suck-up. He seemed awfully eager to receive praise for it. “This is _perfect!_ ”

They were plans to rob a train that would be passing through the area soon, and the dynamite that Arthur had found with Bill were supposed to be used to blow up the tracks to keep the train in place while they robbed it. Dutch was happy with everything that they found, looking at the plans with a hungry gaze, and Arthur knew it meant a job was coming soon.

“Mount back up,” Dutch ordered, “let’s keep moving.”

Hopping back onto the mahogany bay Tennessee Walker that he’d taken from the Adler’s farmstead, it snorted underneath him, tossing its head in disagreement. Arthur missed Boadicea, with her gentle disposition and easygoing nature, and the stubborn stallion underneath him was not making his heart ache for her any less. He had good handling when he wasn’t being a difficult bastard, but he didn’t have the speed that Arthur had grown accustomed to, or the obedience.

They rode through the snow, and Arthur was glad his hair had grown longer, because otherwise his ears would be freezing off. He still wanted to get it cut as soon as they reached civilization, as preferred keeping it short and trimmed, even when it seemed the rest of his gang never even shaved. Smushing his hat farther onto his head, he shivered, wetting his chapped lips while he gazed at their surroundings. Ambarino was a beautiful state, even when they were waist-deep in snow and surrounded by wolves and bears.

Talking about the robbery, and their plans for the train, something was grating on Arthur’s mind. “You know, Dutch,” he drawled as they crested a hill, “they’ll come after us.”

“Oh, of course they will,” Dutch agreed easily, too casual for comfort, “just like all the rest.” Arthur frowned, encouraging his mount to pick up speed and keep pace with the Count, and the stallion whinnied in protest, although he reluctantly did as Arthur commanded. Patting his neck gently, he hoped it soothed him, because getting bucked off was the last thing he wanted. “But we’re always going to stay a step ahead of them,” he assured, “make sure we always know where _they_ are before they know where _we_ are.”

Arthur couldn’t see how it was possible to always be a step ahead, but he trusted Dutch, and he trusted his decisions and plans. If he said that they could play the game to their advantage, then he believed him. A noise to their left attracted his attention, but it was just snow falling from a nearby tree, and he forced himself to ignore it. The empty mountains were making him paranoid.

“We allowed ourselves to get a step behind in Blackwater,” Dutch continued bitterly, his harsh voice one of anger and vitriolic disgust, “but that won’t happen again.” He fell silent while they rode through the evergreen trees, and the tension was palpable. Blackwater had been a mess, a mistake they hadn’t been able to afford, but they had survived and that was all they could really ask for, although they’d lost Davey and Jenny, perhaps Mac as well, seeing as he’d been shot full of holes when they’d parted. “Let’s dig in,” Dutch ordered, suddenly picking up speed, “and make some ground!”

The mahogany bay horse protested again, but he kept speed with the others as they approached a river, the winding body of water mostly frozen in the harsh, cold climate. While they rode through the snow, he thought he could make out a pair of figures standing at the edge of a river, although through the flurry of snow he couldn’t tell for sure.

“Hey, you see that feller?” Dutch asked, and Arthur grunted in acknowledgement. They got closer, and he would’ve seemed familiar on his own, but the flaxen roan horse standing next to him was distinctive. “Wasn’t he at the camp with Colm?”

And if he hadn’t remembered him before, the nervous way he leapt onto the back of his horse and encouraged it to run in the opposite direction would’ve been familiar. “Leave him to me,” Arthur assured, encouraging his steed to pick up speed and chase him down.

“Just make sure to bring him back alive,” Dutch said pointedly. Arthur rolled his eyes at the sarcastic reminder — Dutch knew that Arthur didn’t need to be told to bring a target back alive. He was more likely to get angry at him for sparing somebody than killing them needlessly.

Instead of his shotgun or his cattleman revolver, he pulled out a lasso from his bag, crossing the icy river and chasing after the man with the rope clasped loosely in his hands. Wind whipping at his face, he encouraged the horse to race forwards, and while catching up to the O’Driscoll proved shockingly difficult, the man having proven to be a skilled rider who was used to racing through the mountains, Arthur was unafraid to take risky shortcuts in their chase while he seemed reluctant to risk his stallion.

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” The O’Driscoll finally squawked when Arthur got within shouting distance, and Arthur barked out a harsh laugh, racing closer to the man by leaping over a large rock. His horse stumbled, but the stallion quickly caught his footing, and Arthur readied his lasso, lifting it upwards and starting to swing it in easy circles. Through the loop forwards, he watched with satisfaction as it wrapped around his waist, and he pulled him off of his horse, slowing to a stop while he fell off its back. “Shit, no!” He cursed, voice panicky and high-pitched.

“You’re coming with me,” Arthur grumbled.

“Please, don’t kill me, please,” the O’Driscoll begged, eyes wide and terrified, and he almost felt guilty for how scared the boy looked. He couldn’t have been older than twenty-five, Arthur figured. Whinnying, the flaxen roan stallion trotted around fretfully while Arthur dismounted, walking up to the struggling man while keeping him restrained. He almost felt bad for him, catching the fearful glimmer in his eyes while he struggled to free himself, and Arthur hogtied him quickly, checking the knot. When he looted him, he found a handful of change and, strangely enough, a golden wedding ring. “I’m no use to you,” he said, his tone one of panicked desperation.

Picking him up, was shockingly easy to carry him, tossing him over the back of his mahogany bay stallion and securing him to ensure he didn’t fall off on the way back to Colter. He wondered how much he weighed, and how skinny he was underneath the thick woolen coat and other layers he was wearing. His flaxen roan trotted behind nervously, and Arthur felt a pang in his heart when he remembered the way Boadicea used to follow after him, even when he was entering buildings or walking through camp. She damn near trampled someone in a saloon once trying to help him during a bar fight.

“What’s your name, boy?” Arthur gritted out.

“I don’t know!” He answered, voice trembly with cold and panic.

Arthur damn near laughed. “You don’t know your own name?” He asked mockingly, and the boy made a noise halfway between a groan and a sob, evidently thinking it was gonna’ get him a lashing.

“It’s Kieran,” he said, the words tumbling out of his mouth.

“Kieran _what?_ ” Arthur pressed, and he exhaled shakily.

“Duffy,” he finished, “it’s Kieran Duffy.”

The name sounded Irish, and he thought back to Sean, and how he’d likely pick on the boy for his pronunciation. If he was still around, of course, because he’d gotten separated from the gang while fleeing Blackwater. “Well, I ain’t gonna’ lie to you,” Arthur drawled, pulling his hat farther down his face, “this is a real bad day for you, Kieran Duffy.”

“Where are you taking me?” Kieran asked hesitantly, sounding almost afraid to know, although he was still curious enough to ask the question. Arthur huffed a wry laugh.

“Somewhere you ain’t gonna’ like,” Arthur answered, leaving it there.

“Why?” Kieran pressed, and Arthur was starting to grow irritated. “What’re you gonna’ do to me?”

“Something you ain’t gonna’ like,” he grunted, and Kieran made a wounded noise of fear. It made satisfaction bloom inside of him when he didn’t ask another question, or say anything else. The O’Driscoll, as much as he felt pity for the boy, had been gradually getting on his nerves. “So I advise you to save your breath for screaming.”

“No, please,” he begged, but Arthur kept riding.

He pleaded for him to stop, but Arthur ignored his pitiful begging, continuing to ride through the snowy plains while squinting to avoid staring at the setting sun. Said he was hurting him, threatened to puke, and Arthur told him to shut his mouth, but the O’Driscoll kept talking. He only shut his mouth permanently when Arthur threatened to break a bone for every word he uttered.

Night had started to settle over Ambarino, and he was slightly worried about wolves coming, but nothing happened right up until they approached the sleepy, abandoned town. “Here we are, you sack of shit.” He drawled, voice gruff and gritty with exhaustion. Hitching his horse, he pulled Kieran off, leaving the flaxen roan stallion who had followed after his master to fret in the center of the town. “Let’s introduce you to the boys.”

“Don’t hurt me, please,” Kieran Duffy begged, and Arthur was still amazed by how easy carrying him was. He could feel bones jutting out through the fabric of his clothes, despite how many layers he must’ve been wearing.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Arthur assured him sarcastically, “they’re _real_ nice.”

When Dutch came out of the cabin, he barked out a harsh laugh, and Arthur dropped the man into the snow in front of him like a sacrifice. “You _found_ the little shit, did you?” He drawled, sounding incredulous, and Arthur had half the mind to get offended, although he let it roll off his shoulders. Dutch knew he didn’t like his temporary horse much, probably figured he’d be unable to chase him down on a steed he was unused to.

“Yup,” Arthur grunted, pushing at him with his foot. The O’Driscoll’s breathing quickened in desperation and fear, and he knew that the boy was utterly terrified. He hoped it would make him talk quicker, when the time came to interrogate him for the location of Colm. Dutch didn’t like to torture people directly, thought it made him too much like them, but Arthur didn’t want to know what sort of punishment Dutch would think up for the boy. “I got him.”

“Very good,” Dutch said like he was praising a dog. Watching while Arthur cut the O’Driscoll loose, he crossed his arms across his chest, smiling smugly down at the boy. “Welcome to your new home,” he drawled sarcastically, “hope you’re _real happy here._ ”

“You want me to make him talk?” Arthur asked, shoving the O’Driscoll to his feet.

“Oh, no,” Dutch said, just as Arthur had expected him to, “right now, all we’ll get is _lies._ ” Turning towards where the other boys were running up, bundled against the cold with their hands pressing down on their hats to keep from letting them fly away in the harsh wind, he smirked. “Uncle, Williamson,” he continued, “tie the maggot up somewhere safe. We get him _hungry,_ first.”

It was an awful way to go, getting starved to death, but Arthur figured that the O’Driscoll would crack long before he could make it to death’s door. If he died in captivity, Arthur supposed it meant he really didn’t know anything, and they’d just killed a messenger, someone who’d hardly been an ant beneath Colm’s dirty boot-heel. He remembered watching Kieran ride off back in the Ewing Basin, and supposed the first step would be finding out what they sent him off to do.

They ended up tying the O’Driscoll to a post in the barn, and after some pleading on the boy’s part, they allowed his horse in as well, putting it in the pen closest to him. He’d damn near cried in relief to have the stallion out of the cold and inside of the relative warmth of the barn. Arthur moved his horse in, too, guiding the mahogany bay stallion to one of the pens, and pointedly did not look at the O’Driscoll while he did so.

It would complicate things if he grew _soft_ on him.


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arthur discovers something about their new prisoner, and Kieran cracks like an egg.

Hunting with Charles had been tiring, but it was worth it to see Pearson’s face light up when they dropped the two deer carcasses into the shack that was functioning as his kitchen.

They’d ridden back to camp in the evening, horses weighed down by the food that they’d managed to hunt for the camp, and while hardly anyone was present, the people who were still awake looked at them in appreciation. It had been a difficult time, and rations were running low, so any additional bit of food helped them survive.

Arthur was walking to his own shelter when he spotted her.

Mary-Beth came walking out of the barn, looking like she was trying not to get caught, and he spotted something clutched close to her chest when he approached her. When she saw him coming close, her eyes widened in panic, mouth opening as she fumbled for an explanation. Eyeing the bloody rags she held in her hands, he frowned pensively, glancing towards the barn. “He ain’t dying in there,” Arthur asked cautiously, keeping his voice quiet to not attract unwanted attention, “is he?”

“No, he ain’t,” Mary-Beth hastened to answer, and after a moment of consideration, he nodded, choosing not to question it. He trusted her to tell them about anything important, and he figured the boy might’ve gotten a bloody nose, or gotten blisters from the ropes keeping him tied to the wooden fences inside. There was the possibility she was sneaking him rations, but it wasn’t too important to Arthur.

“Alright,” Arthur sighed, turning away from her to head towards the dilapidated house where he was sleeping, “let me know if anything changes. And remember, we’re supposed to be starving the fool.”

“I’ll remember,” Mary-Beth promised him.

Arthur made it to his bed, ignoring the conversation Dutch was having at the fireplace inside of the hotel they were holed up inside, and collapsed into it without changing out of his clothing, only bothering to place his hat on the drawers next to him. Muscles relaxing for the first time in nearly a full day, he tried to keep his face buried in his pillow to keep his face safe from the cold, pulling the blanket over himself.

But as hard as he tried to sleep, Arthur tossed and turned in his bed, mind drifting back to the bloody rags that were in Mary-Beth’s hands and their new hostage, with his mousy brown hair and big, fearful eyes. He groaned, shoving his pillow over his head as he mulled over the incident, and when he finally stumbled back out of bed, it was dark outside the cabin.

He hugged his arms around his waist tightly, pulling the fur collar over his lips and nose to stop the harsh winds nipping at his skin, and he was glad nobody was awake while he approached the barn. Pushing its doors open, he was instantly aware of how warm it was, a lantern burning quietly in the corner being the only source of light. It smelled like hay and horse shit, but he preferred the smell over the cold outside.

His eyes fell on the O’Driscoll, his arms still tied to his wooden post, but he was laying against his sleeping horse, face buried in the stallion’s flaxen mane while he slept. Face screwed tightly, lips pursed and brows furrowed, he was hunched over himself, knees pulled up to his chest. There was a thin blanket tossed over him, which Arthur figured was Mary-Beth’s doing, because while the barn was warm, it was only in comparison to outside. His horse’s head was resting in his lap, ear twitching in his sleep as his nostrils flared.

Kieran must’ve either been awake or a light sleeper, because despite how quietly Arthur had entered the barn, his bright blue eyes flew open. Pushing back into his horse, he somehow shrunk in on himself even further, eyes flitting to the stallion while the horse stayed asleep and snorted. “Sir, don’t hurt me,” he pleaded immediately, “ _please—_ ”

“I ain’t here to hurt you,” Arthur interrupted, trying to reassure him so he’d be more willing to talk. The words didn’t seem to comfort the boy, and Arthur sighed, shaking his head while putting his hands on his hips. “I’m just here to ask you a few questions,” he explained.

“I don’t know nothin’ about where Colm is,” Kieran answered hurriedly, seeming to be trying to predict what Arthur was going to ask. It was amusing, how desperate the boy was to appease him, but he also knew it was likely a lie. He probably at least knew a couple of hideouts, if not where Colm himself was laying low. “I _swear_ to you,” he stuttered, “I’m a nobody!”

“That ain’t what I’m here to ask you about,” he snapped, settling down on a bale of hay across from him. The horses were snorting in disgruntlement, and even the peacefully sleeping flaxen roan horse lifted his head, nuzzling at Kieran’s ear. The boy softened at the comforting touch, soother by his horse, and he nodded towards the stallion. “What’s his name?” He asked, softer this time so that the boy would speak, and while Kieran still seemed tense, he was significantly less nervous.

“Branwen,” he answered, easier than he’d said his own name. There was love and admiration in his voice, a deeply rooted affection that Arthur could somehow sympathize with, and he nodded. “She was a princess,” he explained, leaning his head against the horse, “in some of the stories that my parents used to tell me when I was little.”

“You do realize that’s a _stallion,_ right, boy?” Arthur asked, slightly confused, and although the corners of Kieran’s lips twitched upwards, he didn’t quite smile. He waited a moment to see if the boy would continue, but when he didn’t, he sighed. Pulling the ring that he’d looted off of him from his pocket, he held it up, the trinket glinting in the light coming from the lantern. “And why did you have this on you?” He asked, looking him up and down. A skinny, cowardly thing, he doubted he’d managed to land a wife. “You have a girl back home?”

“It was my mother’s ring,” Kieran answered simply, voice small, “died when I was real young.” He swallowed tightly, staring at the band of gold, and before he realized what he was doing, Arthur leaned forwards to tuck it back into his pants pocket, watching as his blue eyes widened in shock. “What’re ya’— wait, what was that—“

“If we kill ya’,” Arthur interrupted, tired of his stuttering, “then I’ll loot it off of you again.”

“Thank you anyways,” Kieran pushed out quickly, looking bashfully at his horse to avoid looking at him. Arthur was glad he didn’t make a bigger fuss out of it, because he was embarrassed enough over how much of a sap he was anyways, although he already knew it would somehow let it slip to the others that he’d let the O’Driscoll boy keep his parents’ damn wedding ring. He was growing soft. “I just wanna’ say,” Kieran stuttered, hands wringing together anxiously in his lap, “you’re a lot nicer than Colm’s folk were.”

“If _this,_ ” Arthur gestured towards where he was laying in the straw and the dirt, with his hands bound and horse shit surrounding him, “counts as _nicer,_ then why the hell did you stick around for so long?”

“The O’Driscoll gang killed the folks I used to ride with,” Kieran answered simply, “and they offered me a- well, a job.” Gaze faraway and mouth set in a tense line, Arthur recognized the expression of someone reliving the past. He also understood that it was unwise to deny an offer from an O’Driscoll, mostly because death was almost always the result. “I’ve ridden with them for a little over three months, now,” he continued softly, “and you’re the nicest man I’ve met all the while.”

“Despite having hogtied you and dragged your sorry ass the whole three miles from Ewing Basin to here?” Arthur asked with a chuckle. He could hear his stomach growling loudly, and while Arthur knew they were supposed to be starving the O’Driscoll, the urge to pull something out of his satchel for him was stronger than he wanted to acknowledge it being.

Arthur had been expecting him to make a wisecrack about it, or bluster his way through an excuse, or to turn around and say he’d been joking, but Kieran looked at him with a serious expression, the set of his jaw determined. “Yes you are, sir,” he answered plainly, sounding utterly convinced of his answer, and it made Arthur’s stomach sink something awful.

He couldn’t muster up the willpower to say anything in response, mind drawing a blank whenever he tried coming up with something to say, and so they sat in an awkward silence, the O’Driscoll keeping quiet as Arthur didn’t prod him more for answers. Branwen nickeled softly, nudging at his owner’s ear, and Arthur couldn’t help it when he removed an oatcake from his saddlebag, leaning forwards to offer it to the stallion. His own mahogany bay horse whinnied in protest, so he offered another to the horse to appease him, the stallion accepting his apology.

“So what was Mary-Beth doin’ with those bloody rags?” He asked at last, finally managing to push the words out of his mouth, and Kieran startled, glancing up at him nervously as his calm confidence melted away.

“It was nothing, mister,” Kieran insisted, sweat beading at his forehead.

Arthur was only more certain that he was hiding something. “I know yer hungry,” he drawled, guilt pooling in his stomach, “and I understand this ain’t a good situation, but if something’s wrong, we still need information out of ya’ about Colm. If yer hurt or sick, we need to know so we can make ya’ better.”

His expression turned conflicted, but he shook his head. “Really, mister,” Kieran insisted tersely, “it’s alright—“

Someone chose that moment to open the door, the squeak of it barely audible, and he whipped around, already thinking through how to explain himself. Luckily, it was only Mary-Beth, carrying clean linens as she walked inside cautiously. “Hey, I’m back,” she called softly, “and I have the clean rags for ya’ to put in your pants. Sorry I’m late, Karen—“

 _“Miss Gaskill!”_ Kieran shouted, scandalized and mortified by her sudden appearance, and Mary-Beth’s widened eyes landed on Arthur.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she gasped, covering her mouth, and when she rushed forwards, Arthur watched numbly as she hurriedly untied the bindings that kept his wrists pinned next to his head and dropped the rags into his lap. Grabbing a stunned Arthur by the elbow, she dragged him out the back of the barn and back into the snow, shoving him away while she closed the doors.

“What the hell was _that?_ ” Arthur asked harshly, anger starting to bubble up inside of him, and she blushed a bright red, shushing him.

“He’s, well,” Mary-Beth started to explain, looking anxiously between the barn doors and Arthur, “he has a lady’s parts, but he’s a man, clear as day.” It didn’t make much sense to Arthur, but he wasn’t in the business of judging folks for their personal choices. He made his own decisions, and he tended to let others make theirs, excepting the especially dumb ones. “And listen, Arthur,” she continued nervously, “you can’t tell the others, _especially_ not Micah or Bill, or even Dutch. They’d tear him apart, I just know it, even more so while he’s locked up.”

“I ain’t gonna’ breathe a word,” Arthur promised her solemnly. Her posture relaxed, shoulders drooping while breathed a sigh of relief. “So he’s just on the rag right now, and nothin’ else is wrong?” He asked, and she nodded, smoothing down her skirts nervously.

“Sorry, Arthur,” Mary-Beth apologized, although she didn’t seem too apologetic, “but we aren’t inhumane enough to deny him clean linens. He’s a sweet boy, I promise he really is.”

“It’s okay,” Arthur assured her. He probably would’ve done the same if he’d been in her position, although he likely would’ve told the others as soon as he found it. He had to admit it was a good thing she was the first to know. “I’ll help ya’ keep it a secret,” he said, “especially since Micah has a... history with female prisoners. Just about assaulted Mrs Adler when we first found her.

Mary-Beth embraced him before rushing away, and Arthur waited for a decent while prior to reentering the barn, ensuring that the O’Driscoll was dressed before going inside. When he pushed the doors open, he found Kieran sitting with his arms wrapped around himself, huddled up against his horse again despite not being bound. White as a sheet, his face was gaunt in the flickering candlelight, and he hadn’t made a run for it.

Approaching Kieran, the O’Driscoll seemed to anticipate him tying him up again, and he even extended his wrists, although Arthur simply waved him off and sat down on a bale of hay across from him. It only served to make him more nervous, curling in on himself and seeming like he was about to faint from fear. It made Arthur feel just a little bad.

“So, the way I figure it is that if you say yer a man,” Arthur drawled, fiddling awkwardly with the hem of his winter coat, “then yer a man. There’s, well, I mean— nothin’ more to it than that.”

“You’re pulling my leg,” Kieran deadpanned. His voice trembled, and Arthur knew he was hopeful.

“I ain’t,” Arthur assured him.

Kieran was suddenly looking at Arthur like he was his salvation, his jaw slack and eyes glassy, and Arthur knew he’d won him over by the expression alone. It almost made him uncomfortable, seeing as the only people who have ever idolized him like that were Sean, Jack, and John when he’d been a young’n, but it made something stir inside of him that wasn’t quite the same familial love he felt for those three individuals.

Quickly, he suppressed whatever thoughts were trying to rise to the forefront of his mind, and settled instead on asking the kid to tell him everything that he knew.

Arthur was proud to drag him through the doors of the barn towards the house he was sharing with Dutch, finding the man sitting next to Hosea by the hearth, conversing in hushed voices with him. When he proclaimed that the boy had cracked, Dutch had beamed while Hosea had sent him a wry, knowing look.

Arthur had elected to ignore the latter, because to acknowledge him meant to recognize he had a growing issue on his hands when he most _definitely_ didn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> High Honor Arthur Morgan is _Big Soft™_ and you can’t change my mind.
> 
> Might continue this later, but I’ve been procrastinating on my WIPs, so we’ll see once I’ve finished those!


End file.
